"Sweet Cream" Flavor

"Sweet Cream" Flavor

I am a huge fan of "sweet cream" ice cream, which is properly made of just cream and sugar and nothing else. (like Vanilla, but without the vanilla, you know?) Growing up, I thought this was a peculiar specialty of this fabulous place we used to get ice cream -- in the back of a feed store in Southwick, MA. (The last time I went, I had to stand on top of a bag of animal feed and lean over a cage of rabbits to pay for my cone.) Imagine my horror to see "Sweet Cream" as the cornerstone flavor at Cold Stone Creamery.....bleh. Was this flavor more common than I knew? I've always bragged about it and tried to convert people to its charms via my own homemade sweet cream, but now am perversely annoyed by the notion of it being coopted by the Home of the Gummy Frozen Substance that Passes for Ice Cream.

Has anyone else experienced real "Sweet Cream" ice cream? Did I spend all those years thinking it was a local secret wrongly?

Incidentally, I just found out that the "feed store ice cream" became an actual ice cream shop and moved just across the border into the Farmington Valley in CT. So, if you are in the area and curious, try the Sweet Cream ice cream at October Farms in Simsbury. (That is, if you can tear yourselves away from other local temples of butterfat like J.Fosters and Tulmeadow Farm.)

Sweet cream is my favorite flavor at Dave & Andy's, which is far and away Pittsburgh's best ice cream emporium. Unfortunately, sweet cream is not popular enough to be a "permanent" flavor, and it is only on the menu maybe 1 out of 4 visits. In part to increase its availability, I have tried to "sell" it to my friends, but usually unsuccessfully. Whenever I travel, I try to visit the local homemade ice creams shops, but I do not recall ever seeing Sweet Cream anywhere but Dave & Andy's.

First ran across this "flavor" (simply the flavor of sweet cream & sugar) years ago at Hillary's Ice Cream at Manassas Mall, Manassas, VA. Didn't see it for several years until Cenla Perks in Alexandria, LA. Now Hagan Daz has made an attempt with a blend of cream, butter, and Hawaiian honey. Wouldn't go out of my way for it again.